The House on Haunted Hill
by Goku Girl
Summary: Vegeta is bribed into going with Goku & Krillin to take their kids trickortreating.


October 18th

Disclaimer: I don't own 'em. Blah, blah, blah. Please don't sue. Yadda, yadda, yadda. I hate writing disclaimers.

Possible warning: Maybe OOC Vegeta. It's your call.

The House on Haunted Hill

Let me tell you a little something about myself. I am a warrior. I am a saiya-jin. I am a murderer.

I am NOT a babysitter.

Try and tell that to some people though. To the onna I am a father. As if I didn't already know.

It all began earlier this morning. The onna cornered me in the kitchen just after lunch and asked me to take the boy out that night. I was sort of wondering why she would ask since usually she's rabid about curfews so I questioned her. I discovered it all had to do with something known as "Halloween".

Halloween, or All Hallows Eve as it is traditionally known as, is the most idiotic holiday I have ever heard of. Ningen decorate their houses with gutted pumpkins, tacky paper bats and ghouls, and various other things. On October thirty-first small children wander around the neighborhood begging adults for treats. This year I was tempted to put cooked spaghetti into a plastic bowl and laugh when the brats screamed in terror after their grubby hands reached for candy and found something else. But nooo, I have to take the brat out trick-or-treating.

To make matters worse, Kakarotto, Krillin and their two brats were coming as well. Just perfect. A night with annoying children and two pathetic men. My life is crap.

"Papa come on!" Trunks called as he and Goten ran ahead of us. I sighed and repeated something continuously to keep myself calm.

'Bulma's reward. Bulma's reward.'

The first house was coming up, a small white one, and there was a light over the doorway. Children were coming down the walkway just as we came to it so I guess it was safe. I pushed the brat forward toward the door and he practically ran up the stairs with Goten and Marron.

"Trick-or-treat!" They chorused. An old onna came to the door and smiled.

"What cute little costumes!" She exclaimed.

Trunks was dressed as a pirate complete with a fake hook and parrot on his shoulder. Goten was a ghost. Seriously. Neither ChiChi or Kakarotto could afford a costume this year so he had a traditional white bed sheet over his head with the eyes cut out. I thought he looked pathetic. Marron was a fairy princess. Now I don't know how the hell you could be a fairy princess if no one has ever seen one before but there she was. It was a pale pink dress with fake wings on her back. Kakarotto, being the childish baka that he is, was a vampire. There were fake plastic teeth in his mouth with equally fake blood on them. If I had chosen a costume it wouldn't be silly as that one. I would have been the killer from those stupid Scream movies complete with a real chainsaw. Now *that* would have scared the shit out of those annoying brats.

"I'm so terribly sorry," the old onna went on, "but I've just run out of candy. Would you like a piece of fruit instead?"

"Sure!" Goten said with enthusiasm. He would have been happy with an old shoe. Trunks frowned, though, and so did Marron. At least those two didn't settle for mediocre things.

After the front door closed and the light went out, Trunks suddenly grinned and reached into his trick-or-treat bag. It was empty of candy but it was filled with something else.

"Spray paint," he said, "toilet paper, silly string, shaving cream, and raw eggs. C'mon you guys, take some!"

"What's that for, Trunks?" Goten asked.

"We said 'trick-or-treat'! We didn't get any candy so we get to play a trick!"

A trick, huh? A slow smirk spread across my face. Now that was something I could have fun with.

"Give me some, brat," I commanded. He handed me a roll of toilet paper but I didn't really have any idea what to do with it.

"You throw it over a tree branch, Papa." he told me. "When it comes back down, you throw it over again until it's all gone."

"That does sound like fun!" Kakarotto grinned. I couldn't believe he just said that. He saw me giving him a disbelieving look because he shrugged. "I wanted some candy too."

"I don't know, you guys," Krillin said in a nervous voice. His brat was getting some eggs. "This doesn't sound right."

"We aren't harming anybody, Krillin," Kakarotto said. "It's fun!"

"You think fighting evil, freakishly strong aliens is fun!"

Both he and I shrugged. "It is," I said.

A few minutes later the house's once spotless windows were covered in egg yolk and the large elm trees were covered in toilet paper and silly string. I slapped five with Kakarotto and, after realizing what I just done, decided to hit him instead. I know it didn't hurt but he said 'ouch' anyway.

We hit three more houses after that and all still had treats. I took all of Trunks', though, and just said that I didn't want him ruining his teeth or getting sick. I knew he didn't believe me but it didn't matter. By the fifth house with candy, I had quite a collection. The next one got 'tricked'.

I was having way too much fun silly stringing the man at the door. He was sputtering curses and just couldn't swing at me. Once the can was empty I threw it at him and went down the walkway. That was when I noticed that my bag wasn't where I had left it.

"WHERE'S MY CANDY?!" I roared. I heard some brats across the street scream in terror and take off. Then I saw two small brats dressed as super heroes run down the street carrying my bag.

"COME BACK HERE YOU LITTLE MONSTERS!"

Of course I chased after them. Why wouldn't I? An entire night's worth of candy wasn't going to any stupid ningen brats. I caught up with them fairly quickly and grabbed them both by the collars. One of them looked scared enough to piss his pants while the other was defiant. When I growled at him, the expression quickly changed.

"Drop the bags," I told them.

"B-but mister!" The terrified one stuttered out. "Only one is yours!"

"Are you deaf?" I asked them. "Did I stutter? DROP THE BAGS NOW!" Two nearly full bags of candy hit the ground. I then dropped them on their feet and pushed them away.

"Your life is being spared today. I wouldn't push my luck." After one last look at me, they ran down the street. I emptied their bags into my own and rejoined the group. I wasn't really going to kill those two boys. I've stopped eating ningen a long time ago. The meat is too tough.

I'm kidding.

While I was taking their candy, I got a big thrill. It was a fun thing to do so of course I wasn't going to stop. I motioned to Trunks to join me and we ran past the trick-or-treaters and snatched their bags. Between us we now had at least four pounds of candy. The night was definitely looking up.

"Can we go there?" Trunks asked me as we came to the end of the block. There was a huge house on a hill there but all of the windows were dark. Next to the house there was a graveyard with mist floating between the headstones. Seriously. It looked abandoned in my opinion. Then I saw a faint light in an upstairs window.

"Why not?" I agreed. "Let's go."

"D-do we have to?" Both Goten and Krillin looked just a little bit nervous. Kakarotto was as excited as the boy and I were.

"Are you two afraid?" I asked with a smirk on my face. "Aw! Wittle Kwillin and Goten awe afwaid!"

"I am NOT afraid!" Goten stood up straighter and marched off down the street. I nodded and followed after him. Krillin was left on the sidewalk. Even his daughter had abandoned him.

"Don't leave me out here alone!" He wailed. We continued to walk through the gates and up the cracked stone path that led up to the front door. The wind began to whistle through the trees and it sounded a little like a troubled spirit moaning. I saw the muscles in his neck work as he took a huge gulp and soon he was running to catch up to us. "WAIT!"

Trunks' fist touched the door as he began to knock on it but instead pushed it open seeing as it wasn't closed in the first place. He peeked into the front room for a moment before motioning us to follow behind him. I found it incredibly amusing that he felt he could protect me. Kakarotto, maybe, but definitely not me. We all ended up in a large room with a dusty wooden floor that stretched from the east window to the west window. There was old furniture crowded around a cold fireplace and a threadbare rug in front of it. Trunks cleared his throat, cupped his hands around his mouth, and called out to the darkness.

"Is there anyone in here?" He received no answer. "Come on! I saw the light upstairs!"

This time he got a response but it probably wasn't the one he was looking for. The door suddenly slammed shut, the sound echoing throughout the entire house. The brats and Krillin jumped but I wasn't afraid. Really, I wasn't.

When the fireplace suddenly flared to life that sort of surprised me but I still didn't feel like running away. The orangish flames cast pale light over the furniture, giving light to the formerly dark room.

"Can we p-please leave now?" Krillin asked in a nervous voice. "I don't like it here."

"Is Krillin, the ningen who stood beside us in the Cell Games, terrified of an empty house?" I turned around and began walking toward the staircase as I spoke to him. "You're supposed to be the strongest human on this planet. Act like... it!" That last word sort of came out as a squeak. I had brushed up against something furry and almost lost it. Spinning around, I prepared to defend myself against.... a stuffed bear statue. They were all laughing at me, even Krillin, and I blushed. Good thing the semi-darkness hid it.

"It's not funny!" I screamed at them. "Shut up!" Krillin did immediately. Nice to see I still hold him in control by fear. That boosted my confidence and I started up stairs that creaked underneath my weight. "I'm checking the rest of this dump out. You all can stay down there."

"I'm coming too, Papa!" Trunks announced as he began to follow me. Just as his foot was about to touch the bottom step, the fireplace was mysteriously snuffed out and we were all left in pictch blackness. I heard someone scream and thumping noises that had to be running. Then the same scream was heard again and lightning flashed as a thunderstorm began. There was Krillin, illuminated by the light of the storm, both his hands on the doorknob, screaming his head off. It was so funny I almost wet myself. When the lightning brightened the room again, I found that the brats were just gone.

"Where the hell did they go?" I asked the other two. Krillin was still trying to calm his heart rate so he didn't answer me. Kakarotto shrugged.

"I couldn't see. It was too dark."

"Well I'm still going exploring. Come along if you want."

Upstairs was just as dusty and abandoned looking as downstairs. The three of us walked along the hallway as the rain began to pound noisily on the roof. That and Krillin's frightened gulps were the only two sounds. As I looked into yet another bedroom, I felt something dripping on my head.

"What the fuck?" I looked up and felt a drop of it now on my nose. "Do you two feel that?"

"Yeah," Kakarotto said as he swiped his finger down his nose. Inspecting it, he sniffed at it and finally sucked on his finger. As my nose wrinkled in disgust, surprise filled his voice. "It's blood!"

"You're kidding!" I tasted a drop from my nose. "You're not kidding."

"Whose blood?" Krillin asked. Then he went sort of pale. "MARRON!" Running off down the hallway, he went looking for his daughter.

"It's not from any of the kids," Kakarotto called after him. "Calm down!" I followed them at a slower pace and jumped as something tapped me on my shoulder. Figuring that it was just Trunks (who else had the nerve to do that besides Kakarotto in front of me?) I turned and got face-to-face with a transparent white ghost. Just so happens that ghosts are the only thing I'm afraid of. So I did the first thing that came to mind. I screamed like an onna and jumped into Kakarotto's arms Scooby Doo style. He looked at me in surprise and soon was doing basically the same thing I had done except he jumped into Krillin's arms. The small man buckled underneath our combined weight and we all went down.

"Go away!" I shouted at the ghost, with my index fingers in the shape of a cross before me. It kept coming, though, and I kept shouting.

"What do you think this is? A bad vampire movie?" Kakarotto said in a slightly shaky voice. He stood and began backing away slowly from the thing. I followed him on the floor. "Nice ghostie! Good ghostie!"

The thing kept coming closer and closer until we hit the end of the hall. It continued forward, however, and I shivered as the thing went straight through my body. It was just like getting stabbed by an icicle. I sensed Kakarotto shudder behind me and Krillin sort of shrieked.

I heard different screams a moment after the ghost vanished and wouldn't you know they belonged to the kids.

"I'm coming Marron! Hold on!" Krillin called as he tried to find a staircase. They were coming from the third floor. Krillin flung open a door and began to climb the steps quickly. We followed behind him and stopped on the third floor landing. The sight I saw was morbid, even in my opinion.

There were bodies strewn everywhere and some were only bits of bodies. That was why the blood was dripping from the ceiling. That and the fact there was a hole in floor. I looked around and by my foot there was a head. I got the urge to kick it so I did. It thudded against a wall and Krillin cringed.

"Could you quit that, Vegeta?" he asked me. "This is bad enough without you playing around." Either he was suddenly growing a spine or the dead bodies scared him even more than I did. I was leaning towards the latter. Kakarotto, eyes large, stared at the scene.

"It looks like somebody went through here with a chainsaw," he said. "Or a really sharp weapon."

"Why would you chop up a body?" I really wanted to know the answer to that. "It wastes time that could be spent on better things. Like finding more victims."

"Is your bloodthirst ever satiated?" Kakarotto asked me with a frown. As if my comment was inappropriate. I think not.

"I'm a saiya-jin, Kakarotto. Of course not." Turning my back to him, I travelled across the room and disappeared through another door. This one led me to a sort of back hallway.

"How big is this damn house anyway?" I asked myself, irritated that I had to search for the brats. I opened door after door after door and there was no sign. Turning a corner, I bumped into something that hit me at waist level. Now that's pretty short considering my height and all.

"Oh hi Papa!" Trunks greeted. "How have you been this lovely evening?" I remained silent but my glare said it all. He jumped back a full foot and dropped down into a defensive stance. Now that hadn't been the reaction I was expecting.

"Go ahead," he said, completely focused. "I'm ready."

I snorted and stepped forward until I was even with him. "Boy, stand up. I'm not going to fight you."

"Really?" he asked me in a shocked voice. Now I know I'm not that bad. He doesn't have any reason to be afraid of me.

"Where are the other brats?"

He shrugged. "I lost Goten and Marron a while ago. We came up on the dumbwaiter."

"Oh that's just fucking great," I said sarcastically. "I don't want to have to hear it from Kakarotto's bitch that I lost her brat! Go find him, *now*. He's supposed to be your friend. How do you lose a friend?"

Trunks frowned at me as if he was close to a fight. I stared back until he finally sighed and continued down the hall.

"Third door on the right takes you to the staircase." I told him. He nodded and disappeared through the door. Silently counting down, I burst into laughter at his shocked shout.

"What the hell happened in here?!"

"Someone wasn't neat with their murdering, is all." I called out nonchalantly. "I wonder if he's still here." I continued around the corner and I heard Trunks run after me.

"Don't leave me alone with a mass murderer!"

"You could take him, no problem."

"Yeah but still...." He jumped as a squeaking noise errupted from somewhere. It continued for only a minute. Trunks was trembling beside me and I was curious about what it was. Instead of investigating, I decided to scare the boy instead.

"What could that be?" I asked him. "It sounds just like a door on rusty hinges."

"Yeah, that's what it is." Trunks was definitely trying to make himself believe that.

"But it could also be something else."

"Really?" he asked in a small voice.

"Yes, really. Just think about it for a minute." I know that was kind of cruel but it was fun.

"MARRON!" Krillin shouted as he suddenly crossed the hall in front of us. I heard a really huge thud and there was Krillin, lying stunned on the floor. He had run head first into a window.

"Panicking won't help things, you know." I said as I leaned over his prone body. "You'll just end up cracking your skull open."

"Your kid's not lying dead somewhere!" He said to me. "I have to find her!"

Enough was a enough. I mean, really. Grabbing him by the shoulders, I shook him hard. "Listen to me, Krillin. You can sense her am I correct? She has enough ki to be recognized?"

"Yeah," he said.

"Then just search out her ki! If you calm down and think about it, you'll find a solution."

He joined up with Trunks and I when we found the stairs to the attic and to where the light was shining from the window. Kakarotto was already up there when we reached the landing, but he didn't say anything. When I cleared my throat, he turned around with a worried look on his face.

"I don't sense Goten anywhere," he said. "Marron either."

"Oh Kami!" Krillin fell to his knees in despair. "My little Marron-chan's dead! Juuhachi-gou is going to murder me! Why? Why has Kami forsaken me?!"

"And that's a wrap!" A strange voice rang out in the darkness. Lights flared up everywhere rather suddenly until I was blinded by the brightness. There was a group of ningens in the attic and they had turned the entire thing into a sort of mini studio. A man, who was obviously the director, smiled at us and shook our hands.

"That was excellent!" he exclaimed. "Everyone loved it!"

I blinked at him in confusion. "Nani?"

"Could ya say that in English please?"

"What the hell are you talking about? Is that English enough for you?!"

"Oh this," he waved his hand at the setup. "We've got cameras all over the house for our special live edition of 'I Scare You!'. We go all around the world and catch people scared out of their minds on film."

"Do the people amuse you?" I asked him.

"Yeah, they sure do." My hand rose too quick for him to see and before he knew it, he was dead. I had all the ningens' full attention, now, so I decided to ask them all a question.

"Did seeing me afraid amuse you?" They all shook their heads no. "Are you telling the truth?" This time the answer was yes. "Well, I don't believe you." I was just about to hurl yet another ki blast when Kakarotto caught my arm.

"Vegeta, let it go." I know he was talking about the entire topic. Rolling my eyes, I did so. He owed me a favor. "Where are Goten and Marron?"

"The kids are over there, playing sir." The camera man told him. "Mr. Kellam told them to be quiet so that you wouldn't know that they were up here." He smiled sort of weakly. "Are you going to kill me now?"

"No, I'm not." I said. "You've been a good little underling." I was about to pat him on the head when Kakarotto frowned at me. He knew me just a little bit too well. Either that or I'm getting predictable.

Krillin looked up at the camera man with an expression of relief on his face. I think what he said just registered. He ran over and hugged the man before heading off toward the room he had indicated as fast as he could. I shook my head in amusement and turned toward Trunks.

"We're going home, boy. You're mother has a little promise to keep."

"She promised you lots and lots of sex if you took me trick-or-treating didn't she?" I know Trunks wasn't clueless but it still surprised me for some reason. He noticed and smirked.

"I'm not stupid, you know. She told me that those noises at night were just my imagination but I know better." He smiled happily and hugged me around the legs. "Thanks for taking me, Papa. I don't care that Kaasan had to bribe you first."

"Sure, Trunks." I said and he beamed even brighter. "Let's just go home."

So we did and guess what? I let Trunks keep some of his candy.

~OWARI~


End file.
